NRH leaders have confidence in police

By Oscar Trevino and Frank Metts Jr.
Special to the Star-Telegram

Several articles written in previous weeks have attempted to shed a negative light on the chief and officers of the North Richland Hills Police Department.

We do not believe that residents are getting all the facts, and we believe that they deserve to know some of the facts that we know about our department.

First, the department is one of the finest in Tarrant County. Commendation letters are received weekly from residents who describe our officers as caring, respectful and fair.

As anyone knows, when you manage more than 150 people, incidents and problems are bound to occur. Our Police Department is no exception.

One of our officers was disciplined for inappropriate behavior during a SWAT team exercise. Another officer was terminated for improper conduct.

These officers are not representative of our entire department. Our officers are being wrongly judged and labeled because of the inappropriate actions of a few individuals.

Police Chief Tom Shockley is a great leader. He provides strict discipline, which has not always been welcomed by some. Disgruntled individuals have presented distorted and one-sided opinions to the media about the chief.

Shockley has had incidents in his past that have been expunged from his personnel file. He does have an associate degree and graduated from the FBI National Academy.

Neither Shockley's past nor his lack of a bachelor's degree has been a problem or concern with his performance as the leader of our Police Department.

During his leadership, we have seen a tremendous drop in our city's crime rate as well as the shortest response times to emergency calls in our history. We have seen a decrease in juvenile criminal activity and an almost nonexistent gang problem.

When Shockley became chief in 1998, he was faced with the Crime Control and Prevention District sales tax renewal election. The initial election had barely passed in 1996. As chief of police, he led the department to successfully complete the expectations and goals of the first referendum.

The 10-year extension of the crime control district sales tax was overwhelmingly passed in 2001, with more than 80 percent approval from North Richland Hills voters.

Shockley leads our Police Department with discipline, compassion and integrity, and it shows by the significant accomplishments during his tenure.

We do not want any confusion about Shockley's negative reaction to prescription medicine. He had neck surgery and was in the hospital for several days. The day he went home from the hospital, he had an adverse reaction to the medicine prescribed.

We don't think anyone can judge a person by a reaction to medicine prescribed for his recovery.

Shockley has distinguished himself as a fine officer and excellent leader. Our officers showed their support in a letter to the City Council on Jan. 31. It was signed by 103 Police Department employees, officers and civilians, stating their support for Shockley as their chief.

We don't know of any greater statement about a leader than the support that person receives from subordinates.

It's interesting that this information is being printed in the media during the pre-trial phase of lawsuits related to the death of Troy Davis. The information about Shockley has been the same for almost 30 years, and he has never been criticized by the media or others at any time prior to this.

The SWAT team incident that occurred three years ago was properly handled. We hope that a tactic is not being used to attack the chief and department so that the City Council will be forced to pay money to settle the Davis suits.

Our goal is to convey to our city's residents that we are aware of previous incidents in our Police Department and also with our chief. We believe that those have been handled appropriately.

We are also aware of the outstanding performance and praise of our police and can see from statistics and measurements that our officers are making a difference in protecting our community.

The City Council has the utmost respect for our Police Department. We have the utmost confidence in Tom Shockley's leading our officers. We hope that you share this respect and confidence in the North Richland Hills Police Department.

Oscar Trevino is the mayor of North Richland Hills. Frank Metts Jr. is mayor pro tem.

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